


Hunting the Past

by White Aster (white_aster)



Category: XCOM (Video Games) & Related Fandoms, XCOM: Chimera Squad
Genre: Amnesia, Gen, Identity Issues, the elders are dicks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-31
Updated: 2020-05-31
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:47:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24463738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/white_aster/pseuds/White%20Aster
Summary: Zephyr's past is a wound she can't help tending to."If I had a family and if they're still alive, what do I do?  Call them up and say, hey, I used to be your...daughter?  Or sister?"  She shook her head, huffing a bitter laugh.  "I'm sure they'd love that, after all these years...some random person wandering in, opening old wounds.  And not even giving them anything in return."The Director's eyes narrowed slightly.  "Bullshit."
Comments: 6
Kudos: 26





	Hunting the Past

**Author's Note:**

> _Several bits and pieces of lore here are based on the _XCOM: Escalation_ novel (highly recommended for hybrid/Skirmisher lovers):  
> \- Loka was Mox's adjutant (either aide or second-in-command, it's not clear which) when he was in charge of the Wildcat reorientation center in Colorado.  
> \- They would forcibly short out the hybrids' control chips in the field via something that sounded similar to the skulljack, which would scramble the freed hybrids' brains some but would free them of the psionic network. The freed hybrids would be confused for some time and it took a bit to completely deprogram them, thus Zephyr's mention of being caged: it was temporary, until the Skirmishers were sure that she was freethinking and not going to try to kill them.  
> \- It's canon that the Skirmishers taught recruits meditation, I'm guessing to help them clear their minds._
> 
> _Many thanks for the beta from Some_Writer. :D_

"Zephyr."

Director Kelly's voice halted Zephyr's turn toward the training area. A spark of unease at being singled out by authority made her tense, a holdover from ADVENT. Her years in the Skirmishers and now Reclamation hadn't yet stamped it out completely, but now it pissed her off more than anything. 

She pivoted to face the Director, stepping aside to let Axiom pass. "Yes?"

The Director was busy tucking her datapad into her bag, and Zephyr's automatic scan caught on the pistol tucked into the holster inside her waistband. It took a special type of person to carry that class of plasma pistol in that position, and Zephyr's opinion of Jane Kelly ticked up a notch. 

The Director zipped her bag. "Godmother passed on your request to me. I have some info for you."

Zephyr frowned for a moment, then straightened. Oh, that. She'd almost forgotten about that. The unease flared brighter, but for different reasons.

Director Kelly's eyes flicked from side to side. "Is there somewhere we can talk privately?"

Zephyr snorted derisively. City 31's Reclamation HQ was anything but private. The air was filled with conversation as the others dispersed from the Director's briefing, overlaid with the hum of machinery, the tap of keys, and the low beat of whatever trash music Cherub had just turned on in the corner mess. Whisper had turned back to his station and was murmuring something to someone over comms. Godmother and Verge were conferring as they walked over to the city map. Blueblood had caught up to Axiom and they were already arguing over something on the Assembly's prototyping screen. The mess' refrigerator door slammed and Cherub looked ready to squeeze an ungodly amount of ketchup onto something while wiggling to the radio. Zephyr wasn't sure where the others were, but Terminal was still resting her twisted knee, so that ruled the barracks out. If there was anyone Zephyr didn't want to hear this conversation, it was Terminal.

The only place that even approached privacy was the toilets, and Zephyr guessed the Director wouldn't appreciate a briefing in there. Especially if whoever was on cleaning detail had slacked off.

"Not in here." Zephyr turned, heading for the stairs. "Follow me."

Director Kelly followed, then, as they reached the barracks door and kept climbing toward the roof, she chuckled.

"What?" Zephyr said, warily, as she pushed it open.

"Just reminds me of the Avenger," the Director said. "Living in everyone else's armpit. Having to go high or low to get any sort of privacy." 

It was easy to forget that the Director, now softened slightly from age and deskwork, had once been a decorated XCOM soldier. Plasma pistol notwithstanding.

Director Kelly's mouth quirked as she followed Zephyr out onto the roof. "People always headed up to the deck or out into the bush under the hull whenever we set down. So long as you stayed off the landing pad, you could usually find a hiding spot where folks would leave you alone. If it didn't have someone else in it already. Or multiple someones." 

It took a second for Zephyr to realize what she meant. "Ugh."

The Director chuckled, and Zephyr watched her scan the roof in one easy sweep. "I won't keep you waiting," she said. "That site in Melbourne was what you thought it was - small hybrid soldier R&D facility. Good eyes, by the way, picking that up just from what the media got hold of."

> _\--the armor is familiar by now, the weight of the electrostick on her back reassuring. She is third in line, following the unit in front of her, not deviating from formation, but her eyes slide to the side, taking in as much as she can without turning her head. In the months of training and tests, she's never been in this hall, and past the long bank of tinted windows she can see large machinery, a production line of some kind, and uniformed humans apparently oblivious to their presence--_

Zephyr shrugged one shoulder. "It sounded familiar. ADVENT liked hiding experimental facilities in that sort of cover. Industrial areas are isolated, easy to patrol in numbers, easier to contain any--" Zephyr's lip curled, her arms crossing over her chest. "--security breaches. The Skirmishers would target them whenever they could."

Director Kelly nodded, walking over to the edge of the roof to look at the construction site across the street. "I looked over what XCOM got out of the servers. A lot of it had been purged, but one bit the hackers got was part of the HR database. One of the head scientists is still alive. He's got some health problems, and he's not quite all there anymore, but he remembered quite a bit about working for ADVENT." She turned to face Zephyr, leaning back on the low wall ringing the roof. "He hadn't heard of any human conversion work being done at that facility. Evidently it was cloning only. He also didn't recognize you as any phenotype they'd worked with."

Zephyr's hands were balled into fists at her sides. She loosened them, one millimeter at a time. She tilted her head back, breathing deep. A dead end, then. Unsurprising. And yet, she was...disappointed? Was that what that feeling was?

It had been a long shot. Earth was riddled with abandoned ADVENT facilities tucked into buildings, basements, random bits of infrastructure, and every year more were uncovered. 31PD called Reclamation to come deal with them fairly regularly. Usually they were nothing but storage caches, lost warehouses, but every now and then they found someplace that had been a prison or interrogation or research facility (or all three combined). Those were...worse. The last covert detainment facility they'd had to clear had been a nightmare, both for the security system that had attacked them and for the cells full of skeletons it had been guarding.

So. It had been a long shot that a random facility in Australia would be the one she remembered. She'd known that.

 _Breathe. Feel the air move through you._ The voice was Loka's, the same as it had been those first few days in the Skirmisher camp, when Zephyr and the others had still been caged, their brains misfiring with newly freed emotion and panicked thoughts. Zephyr had stood her share of watch with others working their way free of the Elders' control, but for her it had been Loka. _It is not wrong to be angry and afraid. But do not let the emotions drive you. You are in control, not them. They will pass, and when they do, your head will be clearer. Breathe._

It had been a long shot, but Zephyr had been compelled to ask about it anyway. Just...in case.

"I'm sorry," the Director said, spreading her hands. "I wish I had better news."

"Tch. 'Better news'." Zephyr closed her eyes. She wasn't even sure what "better news" would be. That she had once been fully human? That she had not been? That she had once had a name and a family and a life that she no longer remembered?

_Breathe._

She loosened her fists again, stretching out her fingers in her gloves. The wind blew across her scalp, sun-warmed and smelling of exhaust and fries from the Not ADVENT Burger shop down the street.

She wanted to punch something.

_Just breathe._

She _really_ wanted to punch something.

_Brea--_

" _Vraka,_ " she hissed in Elderspeech, whirling and lashing out at the low wall around some bit of machinery. She had the presence of mind, at the last second, to hit it with the heel of her palm rather than her knuckles. She didn't have her combat gloves on, and the last thing she needed was to have to listen to Terminal going on about how she'd broken her hand in the HQ. The woman would laugh her ass off.

The brick wall was topped with heavy, flat grey stones, and Zephyr's palmstrike knocked one loose from its mortar, shoving it toward the machinery to clang against its metal housing. It left a dent, but otherwise didn't seem to do any lasting damage. Zephyr wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not.

> _Breathe, Partana._
> 
> That is not my name! 
> 
> _Then choose another._

Zephyr hissed in a breath through her teeth and shook out her hand, her palm gone numb.

"Feel better?" the Director asked, voice even.

Zephyr made a face, straightening. "...no. I'm sorry. That was...stupid."

The Director shrugged one shoulder, lips quirking. "Don't worry about it. I've punched my share of walls over the years."

Zephyr looked at her, brow furrowed. The Director did not look like a woman who punched walls, but Kelly just raised an eyebrow at her, as if daring her to say so.

Zephyr declined the challenge, shaking her hand again and rolling her shoulder. "Thank you for investigating."

"You're welcome." The Director pushed off the wall behind her. "I'll keep looking. We've got a lead on another facility in Tasmania--"

"No." The words fell out before Zephyr knew they were there. They felt like a reflex, like blocking an incoming blow.

Director Kelly stopped in the middle of settling her bag back on her shoulder. "No?"

Her fingers twitched, curling inward again, and Zephyr forcefully shook them out. Again. "No. I mean...thank you, but don't do that on my account. I should...." She sighed. "I should stop this." The pitch of her voice sounded strange, as if it was unsure how resigned or certain or questioning it was supposed to sound.

"Why?"

Zephyr looked up at the Director again. "Why?"

"Yeah." The Director crossed her arms over her chest. "Why should you stop?"

Zephyr just stared at her. That wasn't the response she'd expected. "It's a waste of time."

"We all gotta spend our time on something."

"It's a waste of _your_ time, XCOM's time. I'm not that important." Zephyr looked away, suddenly not liking how the Director was watching her. It reminded her of Loka, asking questions just to make her think. "And if I even figure it out, what am I going to do? What if the doctors read my DNA wrong and I go through all this trouble and find out I'm just some weird experimental clone after all? And if not...." 

If not? That opened up a whole new set of what-ifs that she felt increasingly unqualified to deal with. 

She didn't want to think about this any more, but the Director was still looking at her expectantly.

" _If_ I find out I was human, _if_ I find out who I was, _if_ I find out my name, what then?" Something burned inside her, and Zephyr had to move. She reached out and grabbed the stone she'd knocked askew, hauling it back roughly into place. " _If_ I had a family and _if_ they're still alive, what do I do? Call them up and say, hey, I used to be your...daughter? Or sister?" She shook her head, huffing a bitter laugh. "I'm sure they'd love that, after all these years...some random person wandering in, opening old wounds. And not even giving them anything in return."

The Director's eyes narrowed slightly. "Bullshit."

All right, _that_ wasn't the response she'd expected, either. Zephyr was just off-balance enough that it made her angry. "What do you mean, bullshit?"

The Director waved a hand. "I mean, bullshit. You have plenty to give them in return, Zephyr."

"I can't be who they lost!" The urge to hit something flared again, but this time Zephyr tamped it down, carefully removing her hands from the stone. "I don't remember that person. I probably won't ever remember."

"Maybe not!" the Director snapped, voice sharper than Zephyr had ever heard it. "But has it occurred to you that--" She stopped, mouth twisting as if she was biting down on the words. She took a deep breath, then blew it out, and when she spoke, her voice was even again. "Look, Zephyr. Only you can decide whether this is important to you or not. I can see it either way." She turned one hand up, as if holding something. "Maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe what matters is who you are now - a pretty admirable and kickass person, I might add."

Zephyr blinked. She wasn't sure what to do with that. People might respect her, but they generally didn't compliment her.

The Director turned up her other hand. "Or...maybe it does matter. Maybe you want to know what you lost. Maybe you want it back, or as much of it as you can manage, even if you don't know what to do with it. That's a pretty human instinct, in case you haven't noticed."

Zephyr sighed, rolling her eyes. She'd noticed.

The Director sighed too, hands shrugging a bit in the air before lowering. "I'm not your therapist. But I don't think there's a right or wrong way to think about this. And for what it's worth...." She paused, some expression washing over her face, there and gone before Zephyr could hope to identify it. "During the Occupation, a lot of people disappeared. I...and everyone else who lived through it...we all know someone...we all know a _lot_ of someones...who just vanished. Even before I joined the Resistance, back when I was in college...people would disappear all the time. Sometimes you'd know what happened: someone saw them marched off by ADVENT. Or their apartment door'd be busted down, their stuff all over the floor. But other times...." 

She turned her hands in the air, flicking her fingers up: poof, like smoke. "Nothing. No clue what they did or what they saw or if they ran or what happened to them. And that doesn't even touch the people who disappeared into the recruitment centers or the abductions during the invasion or any of the other bullshit the aliens pulled." 

Director Kelly's lips tightened, and she shook her head as she moved closer. She held Zephyr's eyes, and for a moment Zephyr was afraid that the woman would try to touch her, but thankfully she didn't. "What I'm saying is...if someone came up to me out of the blue, all these years later and said, 'hey, I don't remember you, but I think I might have been your family'?" She stopped, swallowed, and then...the expression was a smile, kind of, but small and edged with pain. "I would be very happy. To know that they were alive. To have the chance to know them again. And just...." She lifted her chin, lips pressed together. "To know."

"Even...." Zephyr looked down at her hands, at the rounded, slightly pointed nailclaws, the thickened bone and muscle typical of hybrids. She was not ashamed of it, of her strength or her height or her eyes or her face, of any of it. She liked her body. Liked the power and speed of it, liked the things she could do with it. But many, many humans had made it clear that hybrids frightened or disgusted them. "Even if they weren't human anymore?"

"Absolutely." The Director didn't even hesitate. Zephyr appreciated that, even if she wasn't sure she believed her. 

Director Kelly sighed, squinting as the sun came out from behind a cloud. "None of us have gotten out of the last twenty five years without some scars. That's what everyone has to decide: how to deal with what's left of ourselves, and of everyone else. But all you can do is move forward. Whatever that means for you. How everyone else reacts...that's their problem, not yours. You know what I mean?"

Zephyr nodded. She wasn't sure how it helped yet, but she understood the sentiment.

"Good." Kelly moved toward the door, tapping her fist on Zephyr's bicep as she passed, soldier to soldier. "I'll let you know if we find anything."

The fire door shut behind her, and Zephyr closed her eyes.

She pulled in a deep breath, feeling it fill her.

She remembered asking Loka, once, why they taught the Skirmishers to meditate even after they were fully freethinking.

> _It keeps you from thinking too much. Concentrating on breathing keeps you here, rather than deep in your thoughts._
> 
> I thought we were supposed to think for ourselves. 
> 
> _You are. But thinking is a tool, like any other. It can turn in your hands, distract you, cripple you. Not everything you think is real, or reasonable, or even helpful. You would not fire a gun while your hands were trembling, and so it is with thinking. So it is with acting on those thoughts. The breathing meditation stills your mind, steadies your hand. So you can identify the thoughts you should act on and the ones you should ignore._

Zephyr had fallen out of practice, since leaving the Skirmishers. There was too much work and training to do, too much lost sleep to catch up on, to spend time doing nothing.

Perhaps it was time to start again. She obviously had some thinking to do, and she needed to be clearheaded about it.

Zephyr's lungs burned. She held the breath a moment longer, then let it go before turning and heading back inside.


End file.
